Does anyone know anything about gardening?

That's the one. They've also got ones with louvers and things. Plus parasols. So I'd still definitely check out the website.

Glad

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Is it Green Gardener? I'm guessing they supply some commercial like nurseries maybe not farmers. They're friendly and email responsive.

Flower porn ————->>>>>

Definitely going to give lacewing a go on the woolly aphids, cheers!

Just bought these https://www.greengardener.co.uk/product/adult-ladybirds-1610537217/

Another early morning sleep deprived purchase, so fingers crossed they're the right thing (or a the very least a living thing) this time.

You can buy lady birds!?!?!?

dont do it

you can introduce new diseases into your local ladybird population, unless you know what you're doing as I vaguely recall there is one specific type that is ok

British Adalia bipunctata per the website, are those ok?

I found a yellow one in my garden, the ants and wold spiders take care of most of the pests.

That looks an ideal size to turn into a Mediterranean covered courtyard. Put a thin frame over the top, get rid of the trees and grow stuff that climbs. Something like a vine would do well there with big shady leaves in the summer and die back to almost nothing over winter. It would help protect the lawn too. You can pick and freeze the young leaves and use in the kitchen. Other climbers would also do well if you can grow them through for varied interest through the year.

Don’t forget to run festoon style lights along the frame for the full taverna nights effect.

I really cant remember sorry. I was looking into it and from what I read very few people properly breed them in controlled conditions, these are fine. Some people just take larvae from the wild and can potentially introduce new diseases into local pop

I'll try and find the source

Either way its very expensive and they'll probably just fuck off next door, better to plant things that naturally encourage them into your garden

I don't have many ladybugs but lots of ants, ground beetles and wolf spiders. The ants at work are... something. Makes me glad I'm not a beetle :)))

The wrens also love aphids. Going forward the plan is to get/make an insect hotel, hang bird and bat houses, a hedge hog house and stone and branches piles & the lawn gets left wild.

https://www.treehugger.com/why-you-shouldnt-buy-ladybugs-natural-pest-control-your-garden-4858779

The wrens also love aphids. Going forward the plan is to get/make an insect hotel, hang bird and bat houses, a hedge hog house and stone and branches piles & the lawn gets left wild.

Sounds great, I currently have wildlife of the larger variety - foxes. Am torn as they're great, but they make a mess..

They poo / pee and dig I believe? Bye bye tidi garden, hi cleaning and having to secure plants...

They are in the local area, same with badgers but if they visit our garden they are very discreet, no holes or smells :)

The foxes here like to dig up my bulbs and play with them.

Usk has had no rain since March 12.

Cheers everyone for the various suggestions.

I agree about the trees. They are pretty aggressively pruned and are gradually being removed (I've taken at least 6 to the tip so far!). Ideally we'd remove them all but they are a cheap option to cover the ugly fence at the back (buying something that will quickly cover a 5mx2.5m expanse is not cheap) so will leave some at the back.

You can't see from the picture but the back of the house is a bay window so an awning attached to the house wouldn't really work.

I don't particularly want a frame with plants, larger trees round the edge or whatever as there will likely (although I'm not sure the way it is at the moment) be more days when we want to maximise the amount of sun rather than have it blocked and I've no space to store larger stuff when it's not up.

A sail was one of my thoughts. I guess it's three fixings with one of them being a ratchet strap or something. Just concerned about pulling down my wall/fence/house. I guess sinking poles would fix that but access is tight and I'd need to buy/hire stuff to get them in. Time to do some googling on sails I guess.

The sail will be fine except on the fence, it could actually pull that down if you forgot to bring it in when the barometer is sinking.

Probably need to sink a post into concrete or something ( @Colin_the_Bald ?) to anchor to.

I had one for a while*, didn't need a ratchet strap: it's a good opportunity to learn some rope craft - modern tensioning knots are very cool.

It's also good to note that you can use your anchor points to rig a hammock for full relaxation skills.

*See above about fence and barometer.

20 years ago I actually put in the top two-thirds of two telephone poles in our garden for washing line & more importantly Mexican hammock; bury 1/3 of cut-down pole, wedge in with rubble, dry mix. Don’t know if that’s the best way, but they’re still there & plumb (it’s the pic that’s wonky honest)

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I was planning to go side wall, house and back fence post (there are some concreted in fence posts although I suspect they technically belong to the house out the back) to hopefully avoid any disasters.

Whacking some big poles in would be ideal but sounds like a lot of hard work.

I need to put in my fence soon, are fence panels 6ft or 1800mm? I can see both online so I assume the answer is: it depends.

Issue is I haven't chosen mine yet, was going to fit the posts first.

The answer is 'yes' or, more confusingly, 1830mm.

Don't do the posts first, just the one at your starting point, then fix your first panel to it. That will show you exactly where the next post will go and so on. Dig holes 2' or the metric equivalent of your choice deep, using 8' 4"×4" posts for 6' high panels (you can get get away with 3"x3" for a lower fence). Dig the holes 8" wide, allowing for 2" of dry mixed concrete (1 shovel cement: 4 shovels ballast) all round the post, whack the concrete solid all around the post with the end of a broomstick or similar. Job done!

A post level from Screwfix for about £4 is helpful in this process.

Here endeth the sermon, Amen.

A 4x4 post installed by this method would be more than adequate for @aggi. Final note: don't be tempted to use Postcrete, it's shite. About half an hour per post from start to finish is about right.

Further tedious note: allow 1 to 1 1/2 mixes per post if you haven't dug the hole too big. If using 25kg bags of ballast fom your (un)friendly local builders merchant, one shovel of cement per bag, a bag of cement should do 5 bags of ballast. Should you find that your final panel needs cutting down, I shall add a further boring tutorial.

That's what I thought, but then I started seeing diagrams like this that made me think otherwise.

I'm actually fitting it on top of a rubble wall via some chunky galvanized brackets I have. Post level is a good shout though, there should be the possibility of a bit of shimming to the bracket to get things plumb.

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Make sure the wall is absolutely sound or the addition of what is effectively a bloody great sail could pull the lot down in a gale!